


The Physical

by weekend_conspiracy_theorist



Series: Star Trek Prompts [10]
Category: Star Trek: The Original Series
Genre: Episode: s03e10 For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky, Gen, just tagging since it is a heavy theme here, tagging for character death but it's both implied and ultimately is avoided in actual canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-30
Updated: 2017-10-30
Packaged: 2019-01-26 14:42:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12559688
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/weekend_conspiracy_theorist/pseuds/weekend_conspiracy_theorist
Summary: Christine runs Len's bloodwork.





	The Physical

**Author's Note:**

> because I always wanted so much more from canon than I was given

Christine yawns for the third time in ten minutes, and this time she _knows_ Len saw it–and probably the last one, too, by the way he’s huffing at her in a way that manages to convey fondness and frustration in equal measure.

“Go to sleep, Chris,” he tells her kindly, warm hands finding each of her shoulders and squeezing. “The rest of the blood tests can wait till the morning.”

Chris reaches up to set her right hand over his on her left shoulder, tilting her head back to offer him a tired grin. “You know they can’t just as well as I do,” she chides. “The regs are there for a reason; our tests have to be completed within twenty-four hours of sample collection or we start over.”

He huffs again, but he must know she’s right because he changes tactics. “Let me run them, then.”

“Who does that help?” Christine scoffs. She knows he’s just as tired as she is–they’ve been working diligently on wrapping up the ship’s physicals all day, stopping only for food and bathroom breaks, and he’s been looking a bit drawn for the last month or so anyway.

Too many stressful away missions in a row, she thinks. She should have a word with the captain about utilizing the rest of his medstaff once in a while, give “Bones” a break.

With a squeeze to his hand, she observes ruefully, “Besides, yours is one of the only ones I have left, and you know you aren’t allowed to perform your own physical.”

Len mutters something unseemly about the person who penned that particular regulation; Christine snickers under her breath as she leans forward to resume her work. Len lets his hands slip away from her shoulders as she shifts, but he doesn’t move from behind her for a long moment.

“At least let me help you document the results,” he finally says, just as Christine is starting to get annoyed with his silence.

She sighs, turning in her chair to face him properly. “Have you finished your own stack?” she asks doubtfully, crossing one leg over the other and her arms over her chest as she studies his face. He really does look tired, in a chronic sort of way; dark eye bags, slightly sunken cheeks.

He’s almost sallow in color these days, actually. Maybe he’s coming down with someth–

Christine breathes out shakily, reaching forward to squeeze his hand. Her heart thumps like a rabbit in her chest, and he clings back desperately, eyes fluttering shut. “Len, what are you expecting to find in your blood test?”

He licks his lips, telling her, “I’m not sure,” in a way she doesn’t quite believe–and it’s this hesitance to answer that’s truly terrifying. Without letting go of him, Christine stands, kicking away her chair as she fumbles for his blood sample; Len silently provides her with use of his free hand in lieu of her own.

(After she joined Starfleet but before she set foot on a starship, Christine used to daydream about the sorts of things she’d get to see as a nurse on the frontier of medicine, the incredible techniques she’d help develop and the things she’d get to do. She never imagined–)

“Xenopolycythemia,” she reads quietly, her veins like ice, and Len chuckles with a tired sort of irony.

“Of all the deadly diseases in the world, I just had to contract one of the incurable ones, eh?”

(–having to give her best friend a death sentence.)

**Author's Note:**

> originally posted [here](https://enterprisetrampstamp.tumblr.com/post/166768804712/1-4-medbay-team)


End file.
